Labour doesn’t get it: the NHS needs new ideas to survive

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After two years of toxic political warfare over the NHS, you can be forgiven
for forgetting that it was Tony Blair and his Health Secretary Alan Milburn
who decided that to save the NHS they had to modernise it. They introduced
choice and competition, as well as hospital ratings and specialist private
sector treatment centres.

Under Ed Miliband, Labour has abandoned their vision, opposing the “creeping
privatisation” that is “threatening the fabric of the NHS”. There are no
panaceas in health policy, but Mr Miliband needs to rediscover his party’s
reforming zeal.